Hi, On 28-Jun-99 at 19:34, Shane Miller ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > i am getting a SMP linux RH5.2 system. i initially was seeking > a dual pentiumII ASUS board in the 233Mhz-266Mhz range with 128MB. > i thought i should get these PIIs with 512KB L2 cache. and then > three quickie questions presented themselves: > > 1. according to a techie at a store i visited, a dual pentium 90 > is plenty fast. he said there's no need to go up to PIIs and > his dual P90 out performed a faster dual PII mother board running > NT. this was a networking box. i will be writing CAD/CAM software. > i think this guy could be right for network bound apps but that > for CAD/CAM PIIs would be appropriate. would you concur? Don't believe the techie, he is comparing apples with oranges. My recommendation would be rather to take a monoprocessor above the 233 MHz range instead of a dual P90, definitively (P90 are obsolete 5-6 year old procs, soon it will be difficult to find processors below 300 Mhz). You will appreciate a dual processors only if you are often running interactive multi-threaded applications or several applications simultaneously that keep about one proc busy. > 2. since the FAQ says ASUS SMP boards have (almost) no known problems, > i checked out their website. problem is all dual (or quad) MBs > are discontinued. so were can i get one? ?? check http://www.asus.com/products/Specs/MB/p2b-d2-Spec.asp (and others) are still advertised. > 3. if i get a quad-processor MB do i need to put a CPU into each > socket to run linux? i mean, if i'm cheap i might only put 1 or 2 > CPUs right off the start. Yes, it works. But it is not very useful to buy now hardware that won't be used for over a year. Typically if one doesn't upgrade a computer by a substantial factor (say 2) within a year, it is rarely useful to upgrade. Better buy now just what you need, and with the saved money buy new, cheaper hardware later. Dan - Linux SMP list: FIRST see FAQ at http://www.irisa.fr/prive/mentre/smp-faq/ To Unsubscribe: send "unsubscribe linux-smp" to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
